In certain industrial process plants, as for example in steam generating plants, it often becomes necessary to cut out and replace sections of pipe or tubing which have rusted or otherwise become damaged or deteriorated. Such tubing is customarily removed by cutting the tubing with hand held tools such as motor driven saws or cutting torches. These hand directed tools generally produce uneven cuts which make it difficult to weld a replacement pipe onto the cut pipe. Replacement of tubing using hand held cutting tools, therefore, results in high labor costs because of the time and care required to produce an even cut and/or the time and skill required to weld at an uneven cut.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,033,346 to Hillestad et al discloses an apparatus for cutting boiler tubes comprising a movable carriage having a cutting means where the carriage and cutting means are supported on a lateral supporting beam secured adjacently to a bank of boiler tubes. The movable carriage means is stabilized with a plurality of bearings means for engaging the lateral beam and preventing strain and vibrations during the cutting process. The cutting means is preferably powered by a pneumatic motor.
Other known means for holding a motor activated cutting device lack sufficient rigidity to prevent undue flexing and rapid destruction of the cutting blade resulting in a costly, time consuming process, or are unduly cumbersome, again resulting in high labor costs.